A lesson learned
by Archaeologist
Summary: Uther gives Arthur a lesson about power and powerlessness. Merlin off-screen suffers for it.


**Warnings**: hurt, no comfort, somewhat brutal  
**Disclaimer**: The tv show, _Merlin_, and the show's characters do not belong to me. They are the property of Shine and BBC. This is not for profit.**  
Author's Notes (A/N)**: Written for a picture prompt of a closed rough-sawed medieval door with a round iron handle.  
**Characters:** Arthur, Uther, Merlin (off-screen)

* * *

Iron, forged in searing fire, turned and moulded round. Useful, useless. Hanging heavy on the door, mocking him.

And he was powerless.

Powerless to think beyond it, beyond the wood and locks to what lay within.

Powerless to reach for the ring, imprisoned as he was by chains and the cold/warm hands of guards just doing their duty, and he couldn't pull the door open, couldn't shove it wide, couldn't rush in to stop this butchery.

Powerless to escape the sounds muffled by wood's treacherous barrier, the damnable iron ring mocking him for his weakness.

Another scream, shrill-sharp even through the barricades of oak and iron, trailing off into an almost imperceptible whimper. But he knew how it would sound beyond the door: the rattled gasp of desperation as tortured flesh tried to move away, the choked moans as vulnerable, beloved skin wept rivulets of blood, the desperate in-drawn breath and the hacking cough that would surely follow when a throat, torn from shrieking, crying, begging, panted for air.

He knew how the flesh would bear stripes of blood and brutality and his own skin burned in sympathy, ached to touch and sooth and somehow make it right again.

Powerless to stop it.

His own frantic attempts to escape capture, to rescue, had only ended in futility. The king knew him well enough. A dozen guards had been needed to bring him down and even then he'd only been taken because he'd been fool enough to think Uther's understanding would lessen the price.

He wouldn't stop trying, though. He couldn't. Each new scream, weaker now, slipping too fast into silence, was tearing at him, driving helplessness deeper in his heart until he thought he would go mad with it.

It sent him struggling against his captors, his own men; his body became bludgeon, his hands, still encased in iron, weapons to tear at their eyes, their skin, his feet scrambling to kick and thrust and destroy if necessary. Anything, anything to force his way pass and stop the insanity before it was too late.

It wasn't enough.

He began cursing at them, to drown out the sounds of pain, begging them, offering bribes and retribution in equal measure. But they feared him less than the king and in the end, they forced him to his knees, hands pressed against the cold floor, pushed down, restrained until he could do nothing but listen.

Unshed tears were already catching at his throat, rage and helplessness and grief, and no matter what he'd told Merlin all those months ago, he wanted to give in to it. But something held him back. He knew he'd have to be strong for the time when this was finished. And he knew that Merlin would need him then.

A final sound, a groan that was more whimper than scream and behind the wooden door, there was silence.

When the lock finally clicked open, he refused to look up, refused to meet the eyes of the man who had ordered this obscenity. There was the sound of leather boots slap-slapping against the stone. There was a rustle of something beyond the doorway, a murmur of guards arguing what to do next but he didn't listen to them, didn't really do anything but wait.

It was impossibly hard to do.

Brown boots stopped inches from his captive hands and for a moment there was an unyielding silence between them. Then, with a kind of obscene wet slap, the whip dropped carelessly to the floor, leather strips, gore-soaked, hitting the stone and splattering him with blood. Merlin's blood.

He stared down at his skin, horrified, the words he wanted to shout strangling in his throat.

"He may live this time. Next time, I won't be so forgiving." Arthur didn't answer, watched, stunned, as the manacles were removed from his hands - a fool's blood-stained hands. It was only when he was jerked to his feet, that he finally met the eyes of the man who had done this.

There was nothing there but steel grey and implacability. "I hope you've learned your lesson."

Rage would not help; revenge would not. And much as he wanted to rage, to revenge, he did none of those. Instead, he said the only thing he could. "Yes, father."

Another moment, heavy with fury and grief and a thousand things left unsaid and the king turned away, scattering the guards as he stalked past them. Dismissing them all as if they were nothing. Disposable, not worthy of thought. Servants.

Shaking, knowing what awaited him inside and determined to do everything in his limited power to make things right somehow, Arthur turned again to the door, the round iron handle mocking him, and pushed past.

As he looked down at the bloody back and Merlin's upturned face, streaked wet with tears, Arthur realized he'd been taught something Uther had never meant to teach.

It was time to do more than wait, chained and powerless, and listen to the screams of those he loved being punished for his own transgressions. It was time to gather power, to gather influence, to gather command and the strength he'd need to make sure the king would never hurt Merlin again.

A lesson learned.


End file.
